We’ve all heard about Nevada’s “structural deficit.” It’s a theory that Nevada’s tax system is somehow inherently unstable, and hard to predict. Using false logic, advocates of the theory typically want to make our tax revenue “more stable” by increasing taxes and expanding the functions of government. It was central to the debate surrounding Nevada’s job-crushing 2003 tax hikes, and frequently studied and discussed by local government employees and contractors even while rapidly increasing property values generated double-digit annual increases in property tax revenue.

The Tax Foundation’s new analysis of the 2010 US Census shows that little has changed – Nevada remains one of the states most successful in shifting its tax burden off of residents and onto non-residents. The new data shows us ranked 49th in the amount of personal income consumed by state and local taxation, but 37th in the amount of total state and local government spending as a percentage of personal income.